One morning older this month, I woke up to freezing weather and feeling under-the-weather. It was a perfect day to not get out of pajamas—and one thing I felt really grateful for in that moment was that I’d spent a couple hours the day surpassing filling our fridge with the towers blocks of some succulent meals. There was a yellow and rice soup, lots of fresh greens and chopped veggies, creamy hummus, and a batch of morning glory muffins ready to be slathered with butter.

One of my friends recently told me that for him, “happiness is a fridge full of food.” It struck me that there’s a specific repletion that comes from knowing you have the makings of a succulent meal at the ready. Of course, the busyness of modern life ways that most of us don’t have hours to spend preparing ramified meals.

When I get home at the end of a long day, I want to have some healthy supplies options at the ready—and I promise that once you’ve stocked your kitchen, you can make nourishing meals easier than ordering takeout. For me, prepping ingredients superiority is the only way that I’m going to stick to healthy eating with a rented schedule. Enter: meal prep for the week.

How I Meal Prep for the Week

That’s where my easy meal prep strategy comes in. Every weekend, I make just a handful of simple “building block” recipes that I can use as a jumping off point for myriad nourishing meals during the week. Roasted veggies can top a salad or fill a sandwich. A pot of quinoa forms the wiring of a grain bowl, or can wilt a cozy breakfast porridge. These wiring recipes are infinitely versatile, and part of the fun is getting creative and figuring out variegated ways to use them.

Watch the video whilom to see exactly how I knock out these five meal prep tasks in well-nigh an hour, then read on for the word-for-word instructions. But first, some tips for meal prep success.

Prep With the Seasons

How do I decide what ingredients to use in each of these wiring recipes? For me, it’s all well-nigh getting inspired by what’s in season. When you have fresh lettuces or a deep orange sweet potato or perfectly ripe strawberries, they don’t need much to turn them into a succulent meal. It moreover ways you’re getting the maximum nutrition from these whole, unprocessed foods so that you can really squint and finger your best.

Practice Mindful Cooking

If you think you don’t have time to meal prep on a Sunday, try thinking of it as a self-care moment—something you can take your time doing and enjoy the process. I love to pour a glass of kombucha, wine, or make a hot tea, turn on some music, and make my meal prep a ritual. And that wondrous feeling of opening my fridge at the end of a long day and stuff met with healthy, succulent options? The ultimate reward.

Gathering Board

Finally—the perfect wood workbench that’s as hardworking as it is beautiful. Handmade in Seattle from Walnut, it’s an all-in-one wearing board, serving board, and stylish exhibit object for the kitchen counter. A substantial 1″ thickness gives our boards an heirloom quality and supreme durability.

$68 at Casa Zuma

Keep It Easy

You don’t need tons of time (an hour or two is plenty!) or any fancy equipment. Most of these recipes only require a knife, a wearing board, and a sheet pan. I try to be productive and make the most of my time: while the veggies are roasting and the grains are cooking on the stove, I make my dressing and my crunchy seed mix. You’ll get in your own rhythm and sooner won’t plane have to squint at any instructions. Without doing these a few times, you’ll find your flow.

Friendly Reminders

• Clean as you go.
• Write lanugo a list of what you’re going to do in whop so you have a plan of action.
• Remember that plane if you just make a couple of these, it will still make a big difference during the week. Do what you can!

Cook the Grains

A container of cooked grains is one of the most versatile items you can have in your fridge. Cooked grains like farro or quinoa make a unconfined side dish to any protein, or use as the wiring for a grain bowl, top with an egg, or plane warm it up and add nut milk and cinnamon for a breakfast porridge.

Today I’m using quinoa. I love its chewy consistency and plant-based protein, but you can use farro, buckwheat, rice, amaranth, or any others. Here’s how to perfectly melt quinoa:

1. Rinse 1 cup quinoa in a mesh strainer, then place in a small saucepan.
2. Add 1 cup water and a pinch of salt, then bring to a boil.
3. Once boiling, immediately reduce heat to low and cover. Let simmer for 20 minutes, fluffing with a fork halfway through to ensure quinoa isn’t sticking to the marrow of the saucepan.
4. When it’s cooked, I place a folded dish towel between the pot and a lid while it cools to remove glut moisture.

Cooked quinoa keeps in the fridge for five days. To freeze cooked grains, spread them in a single layer on a sultry sheet, and transfer to the freezer for at least two hours. Without the grains are frozen, you can store them in a freezer-safe container.

Roast Veggies

Pretty much any vegetable tastes way largest roasted—cooking at a upper heat concentrates the savor and gives a caramelization that I love.

Here are a few of my favorite veggies to roast:

• sweet potatoes
• broccoli
• cauliflower
• butternut squash
• beets
• baby red potatoes
• cabbage
• brussels sprouts
• tomatoes
• eggplant

Add spices and herbs so that they unchangingly taste variegated and interesting. Sometimes I’ll toss mine in taco seasoning, other times I might drizzle with harissa or infused vinegar, or plane just alimony it simple with a pinch of Italian seasoning. Salt and pepper is unchangingly a must. Once made, they’re a perfect wing to salads, grain bowls, tacos, and sandwiches.

Here’s the perfect method for roasting just well-nigh any type of veggie:

• Preheat oven to 400 F.
• Line a sultry sheet with parchment paper, and spread the veggies in a single layer, leaving some room virtually them so they roast instead of steam. You want the edges to get crispy and brown.
• Drizzle with olive oil, salt, pepper (and any other spices you’re using) and toss them around. Roast until caramelized. (Cooking time will vary based on the veg.)

Handcrafted Wood Salad Bowl

This trappy wood salad trencher is on our dinner table scrutinizingly every night, filled with whatever leaves and veggies are in season topped with a drizzle of quality olive oil. Handmade in Michigan, these are heirloom-quality bowls that are made for sharing good supplies with unconfined friends.

$92 at Casa Zuma

Make a Dressing or Sauce

This is the step that gets me excited well-nigh using my prepped veggies throughout the week. Grains and veggies can get a little wearisome without a flavor-packed sauce to drizzle over everything and make it devourable. Having a mason jar full of dressing at the ready ways you have a salad dressing and a sauce for bowls, tacos, and veggie sides. You can drizzle over a roasted sweet potato or use as a dip for raw veggies. It’s truly your weightier friend when it comes to making easy and succulent meals in a flash.

This week, I’m making one of my favorites, Turmeric Vinaigrette. It’s super simple to make—just add all these ingredients to the blender:

• 1 shallot, peeled and halved
• 1 clove garlic
• 2 tablespoons world cider vinegar
• 2 tablespoons warm water
• 2 teaspoons dijon mustard
• Squeeze of honey
• Teaspoon of ground turmeric
• big pinch of salt and pepper
• ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil

Blend everything up, then store in a mason jar all week.

Prep Your Salad Greens and Raw Veggies

Are you 10x increasingly likely to eat your veggies if they’re once washed and prepped in the fridge? SAME. And my kids are, too. I’ve started keeping a lidded container in the fridge full of chopped carrots, cucumbers, and tintinnabulate peppers so that when they come into the kitchen looking for a snack right surpassing dinner, I can point them to the crudité bowl. And we unchangingly have guacamole, hummus, or my weekly salad dressing (above) that they can pair with their veggie for dipping.

Plus, when you have fresh lettuces and other chopped veggies at the ready, it’s so easy to throw together a salad with whatever dinner you’re serving. I’d much prefer to do all the prep in one go, rather than getting out my salad spinner and wearing workbench over and over. Here’s what I do without my weekend grocery run:

• Wash and dry my lettuce in a salad spinner, then wrap in paper towels to swizzle moisture and store in the produce drawer of the fridge.
• Peel and slice carrots, cucumbers, celery, tintinnabulate peppers, and any other raw veggies I have laying around, so I can hands throw them into school lunches during the week.

Make the Spicy Seed Mix

I’m big on subtracting crunch to just well-nigh everything—sometimes it’s just a handful of chopped nuts or seeds, but I love to have some kind of spicy seed mix in the fridge that I can sprinkle on everything from salads to bowls to veggie sides. It just gives it that little something, ya know?

This recipe is super unsteadfast to any seed, nut, or spice you have on hand. Sometimes I go a little sweeter and add maple syrup or orange zest, but today I’m going savory with sea salt and coriander. Here’s what I do:

• In a small sauté pan, add pumpkin seeds, sliced almonds, and sunflower seeds. Toast on low until they start to smell fragrant, then add sesame seeds, a pinch each of sugar and salt, and some coriander.
• Toast until everything starts to get a little golden brown, then transfer to a mason jar and store in the fridge.

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